Prosecution appeals case of Kersti Kracht and other Porto Franco suspects
The Office of the Prosecutor General has filed an appeal with the Supreme Court in the criminal case involving Kersti Kracht, Hillar Teder, Toomas Tamm and Jüri Põld, recently acquitted of violating procedural restrictions.
According to Chief State Prosecutor Taavi Pern, the prosecution is asking the Supreme Court to determine whether the two lower courts followed all principles accepted in existing case law when evaluating the evidence and whether they were justified in acquitting the defendants, Delfi reported.
"We are also asking the court to assess whether the circuit court correctly applied the criminal provisions related to the giving and receiving of bribes and to violations of procedural restrictions," he said.
Pern said that when the prosecution brought the charges, it concluded that the evidence gathered during the investigation, taken as a whole, supported the allegation that the defendants had committed the acts described in the indictment.
The Harju District Court found Kersti Kracht guilty of violating procedural restrictions and acquitted the other defendants. The Tallinn Circuit Court later acquitted all defendants on all charges.
Kracht was initially convicted of making decisions between 2019 and 2021 in favor of the law firm TGS Baltic while serving as an adviser to then-Minister of Finance Martin Helme (EKRE). According to the court, Kracht should have recused herself from discussions in which she had a conflict of interest.
The Tallinn Circuit Court upheld the portion of the Harju District Court's March 31 ruling last year that acquitted Kersti Kracht and businessmen Hillar Teder and Toomas Tamm of bribery charges, as well as Jüri Põld of aiding and abetting a bribery offense in the so-called Porto Franco case.
The court also left unchanged the lower court's decision acquitting Kracht, Teder and Põld of charges related to a money laundering agreement and acquitting Põld of charges of unlawful handling of firearms.
"After a thorough analysis of the circuit court's ruling, we concluded that the case still raises legal questions that can only be definitively resolved by the Supreme Court. Following the appeal of the circuit court's decision, the Supreme Court will have the opportunity to decide whether the prosecution's appeal merits review by the highest court," Pern said.
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Editor: Marcus Turovski, Mirjam Mäekivi
